Lidl’s £3.99 'designer’ aftershave put to the test

BY Harry Wallop |
01 October 2012

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Grasse in Provence, and Mysore in southern India. Names redolent of lavender and sandalwood. But there is now a third which should be added to the great global inventory of perfume powerhouses: Merton, in south-west London.

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This is the British headquarters of Lidl, the German supermarket, which has a reputation for keenly priced cherry brandy and an eclectic selection of sausages, jams and rather good apple juice.

And last week the discount supermarket started selling its own-brand men's eau de toilette: X-Bolt by G Bellini - yours for the princely sum of £3.99.

The press release announced that the fragrance was brought out "in response to enormous public demand", a statement as improbable as it is laughable. Even its name suggests a dodgy Italian trying to inject his flagging love life with a bit of Jamaican swagger.

Surely this concoction was a hoax, a melange of battery acid and rancid yak's milk designed to fool gullible cut-price metrosexuals such as me? It was time to visit my local outlet in north London to find out more.

The rumours were true. Right by the tills, alongside bumper packets of Daz and discount bottles of Bristol Cream (£2.99) was a large pile of silver boxes, which - apart from the ludicrous brand name - looked in most respects like authentic aftershave packaging.

The real test for X-Bolt, of course, would be in the smelling. Lidl claims its product has beaten far better-known rivals - including David Beckham Homme, Dior Homme, D & G The One and Hugo Boss Bottled - in a blind test.

It says the survey was undertaken by 108 people in Mayfair - the clear implication being that gentlemen who wander around Bond Street and Berkeley Square have refined olfactory receptors and would be able to spot an out-of-date splash of patchouli or an iffy dash of deer musk.

At first, when I sprayed my wrist, the X-Bolt was disappointingly innocuous. I was secretly hoping for some violent whiff of slurry to confirm my hunch that this was all a clever PR stunt.

But no, this was definitely a proper eau de toilette - and one determined not to offend.

Initially, the only scent I could detect was old-fashioned sweet shop: bonbons and barley sugar. Not entirely unpleasant. And then, the undertones started to seep into my nostrils. Frangipani and pears, a sort of poire clafoutis; then came vanilla, not quite the heady scent of Madagascan pods, slightly more the manufactured vanilla you get in an Ambi Pur plug-in air freshener; finally, an aroma of wood, which at a stretch might pass for sandalwood.

The overall effect was as if I had rubbed various fruit-based patisserie goods over my body while walking through a carpenter's shop. Not an aroma I would choose to splash on, but certainly more sophisticated than I expected.

Vanessa Musson, a perfume blogger who describes herself as a "fumehead", was another who was pleasantly surprised.

"It is not elegant or refined when you open it. As with many perfumes, especially male ones, there is that alcoholic, chemical kick at first. But then there is a luminous, airy quality. And the fruity notes are nice.

"I think for £3.99 it's a complete bargain. Even if I was being harsh, I'd give it seven out of 10. It's perfect as an alternative, everyday scent. And as it wears off it leaves a murmur on your skin - that's when it is at its best."

She spotted that its packaging, bottle and indeed aroma was very similar to Hugo Boss Bottled, one of Britain's bestselling male fragrances. At £39.99, it is precisely 10 times the price of its Lidl counterpart.

I decided to visit the London College of Fashion, a seedbank for the country's future style leaders, and douse myself in the two different eaux de toilette. Could they tell the boutique from the brothel, could they sniff out the Duke from the dustman?

Cheap thrills: Natasha Slee, Lucy Vincent and Libby Page of the London College of Fashion give Harry the smell test (MARTIN POPE)

In an entirely unscientific test, three final-year students voted two-to-one in favour of the Hugo Boss. But none was scathing about Lidl's effort.

Far from it. Natasha Slee, who sported a distinctly trendy pair of green leggings from American Apparel, said: "I thought the Lidl one was more subtle; I don't like over-overpowering scents."

Even Libby Page, who voted for the Hugo Boss, said: "I couldn't really tell the difference, but the Hugo Boss one lasted longer in the nostril."

Ah, here we come to the nub of the issue. Though the Lidl fragrance rated well, she is right to point out that it faded quickly. After an hour I was only able to detect a faint fruity caramel smell on my wrists. For some, of course, that would be a definite bonus.

But Rebecca Lacey, a perfume buyer at John Lewis, says: "You get what you pay for, especially when it comes to longevity. It's OK for a woman to keep going into her handbag and spraying herself, but does a man really want to be walking down the road and spraying on eau de toilette?"

The department store has enjoyed a bit of a boom in male fragrances over the past year, with sales up 17 per cent. New upmarket brands, such as Miller Harris, a nichey women's independent which has lately branched out into the male market, or neo-retro Murdock London, purveyors of Reggie Kray chic to the dandies of Dalston, are selling particularly well; but famous names such as Tom Ford and Prada are still going strong, too.

Some of these scents cost £70 or even £90 a bottle, which makes one wonder if upmarket fragrances, apart from lasting longer on the skin, are mostly about the branding and packaging rather than the smell.

Musson says: "It's personal choice. If you get a visceral pull the moment you smell it, then £200 a bottle is worth it - it's insane, I know. However, when it comes to the £30 or £40 category, with the exception of some Chanel, most are complete dross."

Lidl is entering a very crowded and large area, with the UK male fragrance market worth about £350 million. Mintel, the market research company, calculated that of 788 new fragrances launched in Britain last year, 152 were male ones. Many will last no more than a year or two.

The checkout girl at my local branch of Lidl said customers had been putting the X-Bolt into their baskets in high numbers, and there is no reason to doubt her.

During the height of the recession, Lidl managed to attract a fair number of the smart crowd with £4.99 lobsters and very passable (and dirt-cheap) champagne. Could it now pull off the same trick again, seducing customers away from Selfridges and John Lewis with its cheap, cheerful scent?